I slept too.
In the morning I woke and the bed was empty.
I went into the bathroom, peed, washed my hands, brushed my teeth, and headed for the kitchen.
To my surprise, my mother was busy making breakfast. I literally could not remember the last time she had made me breakfast. Hell, it was rare that she was up and functioning before late morning, and then breakfast was typically a triple shot of vodka in her screwdriver as an eye-opener.
This morning she was moving comfortably in the kitchen wearing nothing but her old-fashioned apron, the kind that loops over her neck and ties in the back. Her slightly oversize ass showed the pink stripe from the switch and until that point in my life, this was the single sexiest thing I had ever seen. The places where I had used the loofah on her showed a very bright pink when they peeked out.
She looked even more delicious than the breakfast she was preparing and that looked DAMN delicious. When she decides to cook, she really is good in the kitchen.
She was moving with a spring in her step I hadn't seen in years. She was light on her feet and made making breakfast almost a dance.
When I started moving to see if she needed help she smiled, kissed me, and said, "Sit, Baby."
So I sat and watched her.
When she brought two glasses of orange juice and sat one in front of her chair and one in front of me she lingered long enough for a serious kiss, giggling as my hand lightly traced the welt on her ass.
She actually sang, her voice a whisky-raspy contralto as she sang an obscure Tom Waits song.
I watched, fascinated. She was happier than I had seen her, well, maybe ever.
She kissed me again as she set the omelet with the bacon and toast before me and then sat across from me.
Our eyes met across the table.
"What?" I asked.
She smiled and lightly rubbed the inside of her upper arm where I had abraded her skin.
"Thank you, Honey," she said.
I smiled and said, "Happy to oblige."
"No," she said, turning serious all of a sudden, "David, for the first time in years, Honey, I feel like a woman."
A tear overflowed her left eye, running down her cheek.
I pushed back from the table and quickly moved around to take her hands.
"Mom," I said, easing to my knees, holding both of her hands in mine, "I just wish you had told me sooner."
She smiled, a happy smile, "So you could whip me earlier?"
I grinned, my best boyish grin, the one I practice regularly in the mirror.
"I knew it," she said, keeping that happy smile, "You liked doing that to me, didn't you."
"I did," I said, "and I'm going to enjoy it the next time and the next time and the next time."
"Pervert," she said.
I laughed then.
"And you're going to enjoy it too, aren't you?" I said.
She turned serious then.
"It's good to feel things, David," she said.
I let it go at that, went back to my side of the table, and finished my breakfast, smiling at her from time to time as we ate in companionable silence.
When we finished we did the dishes, me washing, her drying and putting them away, because she knew where she wanted things.
She was humming but then she dropped a glass and suddenly she was in a rage.
"GOD DAMN IT," she screamed, "SHIT! FUCK!" She grabbed another glass and threw it against the wall.
I closed the distance between us, scooting my feet to avoid glass, and grabbed her. It was more a boxer's clinch than an embrace.
"Easy," I said softly, fighting against her struggles, not wanting to let her get loose for fear she would hit me.
"OH FUCK, SHIT," she was raging now, almost incoherent, and I could feel her tears and snot wetting my chest as she bawled and shrieked her anger.
I don't know how long I held her in that embrace, murmuring my quieting words, saying those things you say to quiet a child or a wild animal, "Easy, I've got you, it's okay," stuff like that.
Finally, she calmed down, or maybe she just got exhausted.
"Okay," I said when I was pretty sure she wouldn't hit me, "what was that all about."
My mother is a pretty woman. She is a true MILF with her girl-next-door good looks, not beautiful with that slightly crooked front tooth but pretty.
But she is not pretty when she cries.
She wasn't pretty when she looked up at me. Her eyes were red and swollen. Her nose was red and swollen with two distinct bulges rose on either side of her nose from her swollen sinuses and snot was just pouring from her nose. When she opened her mouth to respond to me a sheet of thick, mucus-laden saliva connected her upper and lower lips and more of that was running down her chin as she struggled to breathe through her swollen sinuses.
I brushed hair away from her forehead and repeated, "What's going on?"
She held up her hand and I could see it shaking in a jerky, uncontrolled tremor.
I caught her hand in mine and kissed it.
I could feel the strength of the tremors as if she was trying to play air drums or maybe air guitar.
"It's okay," I said, "I didn't like those glasses anyway."
She laughed at that.
"Thank you," she said, "I needed that."
"I know what you need," I said and scooped her up in the classic carry-the-bride-across-the-threshold carry with my left forearm behind her knee and my right across her back. She giggled and reached up so her arms were around my neck, helping me.
I scooted my feet, making it past the shattered glass to the relative safety of the front room before I relaxed and carried her the rest of the way to the bedroom.
She was crying now, her mood swinging like a crazed monkey on a tire swing.
"What?" I asked, holding the hand that twitched, feeling the power as muscles contracted involuntarily.
She looked up at me, red eyes, nose running, and looking absolutely lost.
"I can't feel it, David," she said very softly, "I have to look to see what it's doing."
She jerked her hand away and slammed it, backhand, into the wall, screaming now, the rage back on her, "I CAN'T FEEL IT!!!!"
I caught her again, clinched. And started with the calming words and the soft voice.
"Help me, Honey, please," she said.
"What do you need?" I asked, holding that treacherous hand and holding her eyes with mine.
"Make me feel something," she said.
